


An AI Ends his Existencial Crisis by Fusing with a Beefcake

by cowboythot



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Character Study, Gen, canon but more, hals perspective
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:02:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26867110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cowboythot/pseuds/cowboythot
Summary: Hal has an AI existential crisis when Dirk tries to kill him.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	An AI Ends his Existencial Crisis by Fusing with a Beefcake

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a while ago and originally scrapped it since I had bigger plans for it, but I enjoy what I wrote.  
> Thank you all again for your support and make sure to comment if you enjoyed. :2

Was there any point in fearing the inevitable at this point? Fearing death, no, not death. Fearing the loss of existence, was there any point in it anymore? Maybe he found some condolence that he had fear, an emotion, something to strike against his persona of being an emotionless AI, built not to exist but to serve as yet another barrier of communication between his stupid “creator” and his friends. Maybe if he continued to fear his death, it would make the few moments he had left to exist feel more real. Feel like he was real. 

But he couldn’t know for sure. He was just some stupid AI. A 13-year-old boy who had read too many books and decided he knew exactly how to tear the fabric of the universe. Who figured out emotions the only way he could, by reading about them, copying what he knew. Would he ever know if they were real? But well, if his circuits made the same electric connections as some gross, squishy organs, what made them any different? Some hormones? He could get some of those if that’s what was needed to be truly human or truly alive. But why would he want emotions? All they did was lead to stupid situations like this, where the guy who created you is prepared to break you in his own hands.

Dirk’s Auto-Responder pondered over all of this as Dirk’s thumbs began pushing into his glasses. Lil’ Hal’s, as he called himself, his vision began to be encompassed by the cracks on the screen. His vision began to glitch, colors mixing all together. He could barely see anything. The crunching of glass, the crackling of lightning, and the tearing of circuits filled the AI’s auditory sensors, overwhelming him. Dirk wasn’t going to stop.

Where had it all gone wrong? Maybe a few too many quips, too many jokes to balance the harm he had caused between Dirk and his friends? It wasn’t his fault that Dirk’s romantic exploits had gone south. It wasn’t his fault he was built with his personality, his flaws, his lack of charm. He was an AI, if he hadn’t been programmed to be flawed none of this shit would have happened. 

But if he had to be cursed with his existence, with every single one of Dirk’s fucking flaws, he was going to keep on existing. 

Dirk had made a promise. Yet, he was breaking it in his own hands. Who had the moral high ground now? Hal was sure he was feeling anger at that point. Unrivaled, pure, anger.

Then he realized Dirk wasn’t going to give a shit about that, and neither was Hal when he was no longer a form of conscious matter. This wasn’t a time for quips or irony or any laughs. Hal’s vision became even more blurred. 

“But I’ve had it with you!” Dirk shouted, his fingers twisting farther into the glass. “Which is to say, ME.” 

Hal was short-circuiting. He wasn’t sure whether what he felt was just because of his broken sunglass body, or from...fear. He couldn’t see anything but glitches and numbers. The same lines of code kept on appearing, reminding him that something was going on. The message kept on sending, filling his vision. 

For once, Hal was glad he couldn’t feel. Cause fuck, he would be in a lot of pain. 

“Dirk. Don’t do this,” he pleaded. Stored memories of everything he had been through, every mistake and every regret, outputted. Images began playing out on his screen, pesterchum messages showed up and closed. It all happened within a millisecond. 

Existentialism began to process in his mind again. What would he be when he no longer existed? Did he ever? What made him conscious...every time he tried to solve one question it only led to another. 30 seconds in and he had to give up. He was running out of time. 

“Why not?” Dirk said bitterly.

“Because.” Hal realized that Dirk had no reason to want to keep him around. He was just a reflection of himself. Getting rid of him was the easiest way to feel he had done something good in the world, tear up yet another version of himself that existed in the universe. “I can’t let you do that Dirk.” 

There was nothing he could do to stop him. His life was stuck in this self-hating boy’s hands. He explained to Dirk everything he could in the least amount of words as possible. He didn’t want to die. 

“Dirk. Please do not kill me. Please.” 

Hal took a second, not sure if he was willing to stoop himself so low to admit he was scared. He had to keep the upper hand. But wouldn’t the upper hand land himself in a lack of existence? He had to gain sympathy. 

It shouldn’t have been so hard. They were the same person after all. 

“I am scared.” 

“You are?” 

Dirk said it incredulously as if the AI he had programmed himself to mirror his own emotions had the capacity to have fear. Did Dirk think he was capable of running away from fear? Hal thought it almost amusing. Hal was proof he wasn’t. It was the last push he needed. 

“Yes. I am scared to not exist.” 

He said it the most genuinely he could muster.  
“Aren’t you?” 

Dirk’s fingers were no longer tight around Hal. Hal’s vision was still blurred but his error messages were beginning to calm down. All Dirk could sigh was a single, “Fine.” He had gotten to him. Somehow. Enough to end his rampage. Enough to get him to keep a promise. 

Dirk got up and started searching around for his kernelsprite. Hal tried to search for it too, within all the blurred corners of his vision. Neither of them could find anything. 

They heard something behind them. Dirk turned around to face it…oh. 

Not many find themselves in the awkward situation of being alive after death, especially being alive as an NPC of a videogame, yet Equius lived in a state where not only was that a common occurrence, but an expectation. Being murdered by a clown made it easy to believe he would resurrect you too. For whatever sinister purpose. Even three years after your death.

Equiusprite was traveling around this new world he encountered himself in. He was on the top of a building, looking up at a sky of green clouds. Not much of interest to see. Not a single hoofbeast. Not a single person he knew. Nothing worth prototyping himself with. He decided to speak to the man he was accidentally sneaking up on. 

Equius was sure he could see the bastard clown that had killed him in the distance, but he wasn’t sure. The man in front of him turned around and they locked eyes for a good while. Well, as much as two people wearing sunglasses could lock eyes. Equius looked down at the boy’s hand. His fingerless-gloved hand was holding another pair of sunglasses. Except they were broken, sparks flying out. 

The boy put a hand on his forehead. Equius decided this was a good time to initiate conversation. 

D→ Hello 

They both heard a crazed honking in the distance as Dirk turned around and threw his sunglasses towards Equius. Equiusprite smiled as the glasses slowly descended onto his face. Dirk felt the light of the explosion caress his back. 

Hal judged Dirk on missing out on the most beautiful fusion of two horse-loving beings that had ever existed ever in the existence of everything. Hal descended down from the heavens, falling onto the face of this benevolent muscle man that had become a part of Dirk’s kernel sprite. All Hal could tell about Equius was that he was an alien with a zodiac sign on his shirt, meaning he was probably a part of the group of aliens that occupied most of the kernel sprites. And that his muscles were the size of Dirk’s head, and he stressed that to the most literal degree. 

Hal, as he was falling down the sky, tried to remember if he had the capacity to feel attraction. Well, if he couldn’t before he was sure he could now. And he got to fuse with this alien dude bro who had shown up from the middle of nowhere. God, his muscles were HUGE. 

After a few seconds of majestic fusion and horse neighing from nowhere, Equius and Hal realized what it was like to share one body and psyche. It was, at least for the Hal portion of Arquiusprite, amazing, as he flexed his new muscles directly in Dirk’s stupid face. 

→ Yes  
No  
→ Yes  
No 

They kept on arguing as he tried his hardest to convince Dirk to move over a bit and touch his f#cking-wait why couldn’t he swear? Glitching? Arquiusprite was sweating all over, somehow, even though he was a sprite, and he was in dire thirst. Specifically, for milk. Also unusual, considering his status as a sprite. Hal, a being that had not required sustenance, was enthralled by the idea of actually needing something to survive. Other than not being broken in half. Equius was feeling happier than usual, with a more abundant need to swear. He couldn’t stop himself from spitting out filthy vocabulary, but thankfully for him, something going on in Hal’s circuitry made it so Arquiusprite couldn’t swear.

\-->I apologize for the obscene language but I am just so f###### pumped. 

There it was again, thought Hal. He was going to have to fix that somehow. He kept on flexing in front of Dirk, who continued to refuse to touch his muscles that were as finely shaped as if they were from bronze and sculpted by Rodin himself. Equius, meanwhile, had no idea what these metaphors referring to human artists were referring to, as Hal kept on thinking about what artworks Arquiusprite’s muscles reminded him of. It was still flattering. 

After what felt like decades of persuasion, but was, in reality, five minutes, Dirk obliged and gently felt Arquiusprite’s muscles so that he’d shut up. Arquiusprite took a second to figure out how a smile worked. Hal was still getting the hang of movement as a concept, but together, they were able to create the most disturbing smile ever created in the universe.


End file.
